Kakao Overtakes Naver in Earnings

Kakao's sales in the third quarter totaled a staggering W1.74 trillion and operating profit W168.2 billion, the company said Thursday (US$1=W1,185).

Despite coming under attack for its aggressive attempts to strangle the competition and squeeze small businesses, Kakao's sales jumped 58.1 percent on-year and operating profit 39.8 percent.

With that Kakao overtook staid online giant Naver in quarterly sales for the first time. The growth mostly came from its content division which includes games, webtoons and other new media.

The division's sales surged 84 percent on-year to W962.1 billion. But operating profit fell short of analysts' predictions of W221.6 billion.